Joe Hollier, a 25-year-old former skater turned technology entrepreneur, describes the moment of transcendental calm when he gave up his smartphone. Mr Hollier had started “going light”, leaving behind his high tech pocket companion and disconnecting from a world defined by ready access to the internet.

乔攠利耶(Joe Hollier)今年25岁，曾经是一名滑板运动员，现在则是一名科技企业家。他将放弃智能手机的那一刻称为超觉平静时刻。奥利耶开始“变轻”，将自己的高科技随身设备抛之脑后，与一个以随时接入互联网为标志的世界割断联系。

It was not easy, he admits. “There is an initial anxiety,” he says. “It’s quite intense. You start tapping your pocket and fidgeting. But then there is this feeling of huge relief.”

他承认，这并不容易。奥利耶表示：“最初感到焦虑。这种感觉相当强烈。你开始拍打口袋，感到坐立不安。但随后就是这种如释重负的感觉了。”

New York-based Mr Hollier and his co-founder Kaiwei Tang used the experience as the basis for a subversive mobile phone being launched this summer: revolutionary not for all the advanced features but for the lack of any at all.

居住在纽约的奥利耶及其联合创始人唐开伟（音译）利用这种体验来推介将于今夏推出的一款颠覆性手机：它的革命性不在于什么高级功能，而是在于它什么高级功能也没有。

The Light Phone allows you to make or take calls, but nothing else. There is only enough storage in the phone for 10 numbers. No messaging, no camera, no internet.

你可以使用Light Phone接打电话，但除此之外什么都不能做。这种电话里只有存储10个号码的空间，不能发短信、没有摄像头，更不能上网。

The design is important: it is simplicity itself in a plastic shell the size of a credit card on which the numbers glow using a dot matrix screen. The recharging grind of most modern smartphones is avoided through a 20-day battery life.

设计非常重要：它的塑料壳是简洁的体现，只有信用卡那么大，点阵屏幕上面的数字发着微光。电池一次可以使用20天，不用像大多数现代智能手机那样经常充电。

“We tested out the concept,” says Mr Hollier, who met Mr Tang at a Google-run tech incubator. “We found that the value was not in what it can do but in the lack of it. We were offering the maximum disconnection with the minimum of choice.”

奥利耶表示：“我们测试了这种概念，结果发现，价值不在于它能做什么，而在于它不能做什么。我们用最少的选择来尽可能地割断联系。”奥利耶在谷歌(Google)运营的一个科技孵化机构遇到了唐开伟。

Mr Tang had been working for a smartphone company but found that the annual cycle of minor product improvements had become “gratuitous and wasteful”, according to Mr Hollier.

据奥利耶表示，唐开伟之前为一家智能手机公司工作，但他发现，年复一年的产品小改进“毫无意义而且浪费”。

In a market where even the cheapest smartphones have the processing power of a basic personal computer, the Light Phone is partly a protest against the digital age. But Mr Hollier hopes it can become more than that: a way for its users to cut out distractions.

在一个即便是最廉价的智能手机都拥有基本个人计算机处理能力的市场里，Light Phone在一定程度上是对数字时代的抗议。但奥利耶希望它的意义不止于此：它还可以让其用户减少分心。

“Solitude and boredom are two of my favourite things,” he says, pointing to the opportunity for creativity. “Pulling out the phone while waiting for a train had become a nervous habit. The side effects were surprisingly severe.”

他说：“独处和无聊是我钟爱的两件事。”他指出迸发创造力的机遇。“等火车的时候拿出手机已成为一个紧张兮兮的习惯。其副作用严重得令人意外。”

The pair raised $415,127 from 3,187 backers on the Kickstarter platform to develop the phone. The device is still at a prototype stage but a company in China has begun manufacturing handsets to be shipped in June. They have taken pre-orders for $100 but say the exact retail price is not yet fixed. The first Light Phone is white; a black version is planned.

这两人在Kickstarter平台上从3187名支持者那里筹集了41.5127万美元以开发Light Phone。该手机目前仍处于样机阶段，一家中国公司已经开始生产，准备在今年6月发货。他们以100美元的价格接受预购，但表示最终的零售价格还没有确定下来。首款Light Phone是白色的，计划今后推出黑色版本。

The device has found unexpected fans. Mr Hollier, who has had an array of jobs from running his own skateboarding company to film-making and graphic design, assumed that people a bit like him would want the phone: younger users who might not want to take their expensive technology to the beach or to go skating. But the device has found special resonance with business users over 45 years old, he says, who enjoyed the days before the constant distractions of the smartphone. “They remember the importance of sitting on a park bench and just thinking.”

Light Phone还发现了出乎意料的粉丝。奥利耶干过许多工作，从经营自己的滑板运动公司，到电影制片和图形设计。他原本认为，和他差不多的人将会想要这种手机：那些较为年轻的、可能不想拿着昂贵手机去海滩或者玩滑板的用户。但他表示，45岁以上的商界人士也对该手机产生了特殊的共鸣，这些人怀念没有智能手机持续干扰之前的平静生活。“他们记得坐在公园椅子上只是静静思考的重要性。”

He says there has been a surprisingly warm reception in Asia, perhaps a backlash against the popularity of “phablet” phones designed primarily for access to the internet and watching video.

他说，这种手机在亚洲受到了意外热捧，这或许是对主要用于上网和观看视频的“平板手机”盛行的反弹。

Mr Hollier admits that most people will also want a smartphone, which can be linked to the Light Phone to forward calls. As a companion device, he says, the Light Phone is useful as an emergency fallback or for carrying when doing physical sports or on an evening out.

奥利耶承认，大多数人还是想要智能手机，而Light Phone可以把智能手机接收的呼叫转接过来。他说，作为一个随身设备，Light Phone可以用于紧急备用手机或者在运动或者晚上外出时携带。

But in trying to create a device purposely designed to be used as little as possible, Mr Hollier and his partner may have stumbled on something that could turn out to be used rather a lot.

但就试图创造一个目的是尽可能不用的设备方面，奥利耶及其合伙人可能创造了一款可能被用得相当多的产品。